1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to record playing apparatus, and more particularly to a record playing apparatus with an automatic record changer of the type in which a record is held on a center spindle and is made to drop onto a turntable to be played.
2. Description of the Prior Art
One type of conventional record changer with a center spindle is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,489,418 to H. J. Fortune et al. The center spindle of the changer functions to support and drop records in sequence by means of a mechanism within the center support which senses the presence or absence of a record for controlling an automatic shut-off mechanism. Along with aforementioned center support for dropping and sensing the records, there is also provided an edge support for the sole purpose of balancing the records. The tone arm is also balanced by a counterweight which is resiliently supported from the tone arm in all directions of relative movement between the tone arm and the counterweight.
However, the conventional record changer disclosed therein is purely mechanically arranged. With such mechanical arrangement, there are provided a start button and a stop button, the former of which is pushed when it is intended to play the record and the latter of which is pushed when it is intended to stop the record playing operation. With this construction, however, it is intended to keep the number of the operating buttons at a minimum and accordingly the operability of the apparatus is not at an optimum level.
Moreover, in this record changer, the returning mechanism of the tone arm and the dropping mechanism of the records are interlocked so that a record always drops when the tone arm is automatically returned. This results in the dropping of a record, even when the automatic-returning operation is performed in response to a stop command. In order to provide a safe operation, the lead-in operation is performed only upon a subsequent start initiation after at least the drive mechanism performs an automatic-returning operation. As a result, a problem occurs in that the record which has dropped in response to the drop command fails to be played. In order to solve this problem, it is conceivable to manually perform the return operation after the system has been set in a non-automatic or manual mode and after the power supply circuit has been broken. However, this method is not preferred because it is inferior in operability.
Furthermore, in order to perform a manual operation as well as an automatic changing operation in the record changer having a construction thus far described, there is provided an operating button for selecting the automatic and manual modes so that the automatic operation can be performed, when it is shifted to the automatic mode, whereas the manual operation can be performed when it is shifted to the manual mode. In other words, the automatic and manual operations operate absolutely independent of each other and cannot be interchanged. As a result, the operability of such record changer is inferior, and a large number of operating buttons must be used.